Archive

A lot of my friends do the “30 Days of Thankfulness” thing on social media in November. While I haven’t consistently gotten into that, there is much to be said for stopping for a minute each day and pondering the good in our lives, and what we have to be grateful for. I don’t do the Write An Essay Every Day thing. Quite frankly, some days it’s really hard to raise up my head enough to do anything besides keep moving forward and breathing in and out. I’ve mentioned my struggles with depression and anxiety a bit on this blog before, but just suffice it to say that when we hit the holiday season, those two near constant companions of mine shift into overdrive. But today, right now, I feel pretty good. So here are 30 things I am grateful for, in no particular order. And we’ll call that the condensed version of my 30 Days of Thankfulness.

My husband. I have known my husband since we were both in the 6th grade at Harding Gibbs Middle School in Firth, ID. We were friends, but not Friends. We ran in different circles entirely going through school. I saw him just twice in person between our high school graduation in 1991 and May of 2014. But what a difference a couple of decades+ make! The timing was awkward, but I don’t regret getting together with him. I love him to pieces. He makes my life easier. Which was a totally new concept for me in being in a relationship with someone. I am ridiculously grateful for him, and I hope I let him know that enough.

TSW

MTW

CMW

JDW….who are

My kids. I have four sons, and I will tell you right now–they are the reason I have survived as long as I have.

My boys with me at my law school graduation

From the “in honor of” note that I put in my law school graduation program: “IHO…my incredibly gifted and attractive sons. I would not have come here (to law school) had I not needed to for you. You are my reason for being. I love you!!” The only thing that’s changed since then is I love them more. They’re pretty incredible young men and adults, and I’m beyond thankful for them… That’s why they get 5 spaces on this list 😉 .

Also from my “in honor of” from my law school grad program: “IHO My phenomenal family and friends: For money deposited regularly (and sometimes surreptitiously) into my checking account; for car maintenance, tires, and tanks of gas; for innumerable pep talks; for cash stuffed into my purse and sent in the mail; for places to stay; for being there for my kids when I couldn’t be; for facilitating me being The Mom to my boys; and for flatly refusing to allow me to quit when it was too hard for me to go on. I will forever be grateful.” The only thing that’s not the same as it was then is that my family and friends have given me MORE support over the years. I am so grateful for them!

Cars that are (currently) running.

Gas prices under $3/gallon.

An actual Job, with direct deposit, paid vacation, paid holidays, and health insurance. It’s pretty awesome, especially having NOT had one for a really long time.

My hubby & Wyoming…a twofer

Wyoming. Wyoming has been very good to me. In particular the Bank of Star Valley and the University of Wyoming. Much kindness has been (and continues to be) poured my way in my difficulties, particularly from the Bank. Those are awesome, solid people.

Humidifiers to ease a cough at night.

Bathtubs and epsom salts soaks.

My nail lady and her fantastically long-lasting shellac nails that are so lovely and so inexpensive that I can afford to look at my hands and see pretty things 🙂 .

My stepchildren. I have 5 of them. They’re good kids, and I’m learning a lot about being a better person from them. So thanks, guys 😉 .

Wide calf knee boots.

Spandex in jeans.

Air conditioning and central heat.

Smartphones. What did we do without smartphones???

My cats. They’re weirdos, for sure, and they shed like mad, the one is a diva, another is kind of a jerk sometimes, and the third is downright Odd, but they really do make my life better, and I’m very glad I get to share my home with them.

Prisms and rainbows. I’ve gotten a little obsessed with them…

The view from the front porch…with mountains.

My home. My husband and I moved into our house in July of 2015. At the time we found it, it was for sale, but we didn’t qualify for a home loan. So we talked the owners into doing a lease purchase agreement on it; we closed on September 30, 2016. My dad co-signed on the mortgage for me. I love my house.

My piano. I just recently inherited this from my mother, as she has just inherited HER mother’s piano. It’s 111 years old, and it’s seen better days, but it’s been a fixture in every Home that has ever felt like Home in my life. I love it.

My piano

My family in law. My husband’s family has welcomed me into their world with open arms and a little bit of sarcasm to boot. They’re fantastic. I’m grateful for them all.

Facebook and Instagram. Social media can definitely be a double-edged sword, but it’s how I keep in touch with people I wouldn’t otherwise ever see. I love that I can share in my brother’s life, even though he lives in Malaysia, on a day-to-day basis. And I’ve met some fantastic people in the far-flung reaches of the country that I love getting to have friendships with, that I otherwise would never have met. I’ve reunited with old friends, and truly appreciate the circle of support that comes with social media. So with all its many flaws, I’m grateful for it.

The Bloggess, aka Jenny Lawson. She has a blog that has been a huge boon in the lives of thousands of people. My first experience with her writing was a post about a giant metal chicken named Beyonce. Her books have made me laugh my tail off, and cry my eyes out. She is an asset to all of us who have dealt with the Invisible illnesses. I’m thankful for her. (You can read that first post that hooked me here ).

My garden, especially homegrown tomatoes and basil.

My washer and dryer.

Electricity.

Mountains. For most of my life I have lived near mountains. They are grounding and settling and orienting, and they give me peace. Thank God for mountains.

Yeah, that was a pretty random list. But life is random, and I am grateful for so many Random things. I will use this list to help me maintain my personal peace as this holiday season crashes in on me….there is much to be grateful for. Weirdo cats and all.

Family law actions are emotional things. While the divvying up of assets, assignment of debts, allocation of custody and parent time, and awards of child support and alimony are black and white things, underlying the entire process is a mess of emotions, largely unpleasant ones. Anger, pain, rage, desperation, panic, despair, sadness, frustration, helplessness, hopelessness….Swirling in with that horrible mix is Fear.

Fear is a huge part of any major life change….fear of the unknown–what happens with my budget when I’m limited to x amount of dollars a month? What happens to my retirement goals when I have to pay out x dollars a month? Why should I have to pay money to this person who is hurting me? When will I get to see my kids? What if my ex makes my kids hate me? How will I pay all the expenses I need to for my kids? What if I can’t pay the rent on this child support/alimony amount? How am I supposed to get a job and take care of my kids at the same time? Who’s gonna hire me??? Is anyone ever gonna want to be with me again????

I would suggest that much of the reason people behave irrationally, do dumb things, say dumb things, try to avoid legal action, or any of the thousands of different ways people end up hurting themselves in family cases is out of fear: “If I avoid the process server, they can’t serve me, and this will all go away.” “He said there’s a warrant out for my arrest if I try and show up to court….I can’t get arrested!”

While legal proceedings can be scary, the best way to deal with them is through Knowledge. Be proactive–don’t wait until the last minute to seek legal advice. If you’re scared about a threat made by the Other, ASK someone who knows or can find out about whether there’s any truth to the threat. If you married a bully, be ready to deal with a bully. Is it scary? Hell YES it is. But avoiding it, hiding, pretending it’s not happening, remaining willfully ignorant will do more to hurt you in the long AND short run than squaring your shoulders and addressing the situation.

Case in point:

I got divorced in 2005. At the time, I’d been a stay at home mom, had 4 kids, the oldest of which were 8 year old twins, and had no money to my own name other than what my husband brought in. My marriage had come apart, and my mental health was deteriorating. I couldn’t stay married and live. And No, I’m not being dramatic when I say that. I was scared to death.

So how did I handle it?

I rolled over and died, in a manner of speaking. My husband hired a lawyer, who drafted an agreement taking everything away from me except for some really minimal bits of Stuff. I didn’t fight to get custody of the kids I’d been primary caretaker of for their entire lives. I didn’t even attempt to stay in my house, or get alimony, or ask for half of the rest of our marital, not-insignificant assets. I signed my husband’s agreement. That became the terms of my divorce, and gave him custody of my kids.

I flat out gave up. Out of paralyzing, crippling Fear. Everything my husband said about how miserable he’d make me if I tried to get even statutory minimums under the law for ANYTHING, I believed. All the little demeaning, demoralizing comments he threw out at me, I believed. I was terrified–terrified of a legal fight, terrified of my kids getting hurt any worse than they already were, terrified of losing my mind before it was all said and done…Terrified. Scared. Panicked.

And so, out of blind, crippling, numbing, paralyzing fear, I gave up. Everything–my kids, my home, any portion of 10 years of marriage…all of it. Without a fight.

Ask me how much I regret that. And when you do, bring tissues, because I’m going to cry my eyes out on you, even though it’s been nearly 13 years since all that happened.

DON’T YOU BE LIKE ME. You be BRAVE. Find your support people. Face your fears, even if you have to face them quietly, by seeking out help online, or at a victim’s crisis center. Get real information. Do a little research. DON’T GO DOWN WITHOUT A FIGHT! For the love of all that is good and holy, I am begging you, do not let fear take your life from you. You can do it. I swear, it’s hard as hell, but you CAN. And you Must.

A final Scene from the story of fear in my life: I am at my Aunt Nancy’s house, curled up on the floor in her bathroom, sobbing out of fear and the misery that came from letting my fear cripple me when it counted most. She is sitting next to me, on the floor, knees pulled up to her chest, her arm around my shoulders. She is saying, “I wish I could poor courage into your spine so you can stand.”

I say to you–Imagine me pouring courage into your spine. Stand up. You may be afraid, but don’t let it control you. You are not alone.

Tomorrow is the first day of school for my kids. I have a freshman and a senior in high school, starting Tomorrow. The first day of school is always a little bittersweet. It’s exciting to see my kids getting older, growing, all those great things that parents so enjoy, that we are lucky to be able to witness. But it’s also just another marker of time, and my children growing up, and not being Children anymore.

First day of school 2010…they’re not little anymore…

I have been there for the first day of school every year since my divorce was final, 12 1/2 years ago. Whether I lived 2 minutes away or 7 hours away. There were a lot of years that I’d hug my kids, see them off on the bus, then drive away and cry for hours. I don’t have to drive away and cry anymore–tomorrow, for the first time EVER, school is starting during MY parent time week. Not that it really matters much anymore…I’ve lived within 3 blocks of my ex-husband for going on 3 years now, so even if he has the kids for the week, I’m just a minute away.

The hard part for me is the Looking Back that we tend to do at the beginning of a new school year. And I’m not over all the loss from the past years enough yet to do that without becoming an emotional mess. You know what they say–Time and mercy heal all wounds. Still waiting on time and mercy….

I spent last Friday in a divorce mediation. The marriage spanned two decades; the parties have 5 kids. By my client’s account, it was not a happy marriage, and the miracle was that it had not ended sooner.

The agreement we mediated was about as good as it gets in terms of being a statutorily equitable split. My client WANTS to get divorced, but she’s still very upset about the whole thing. It’s just not really fair, even if it’s equitable. And Why?

Because it will never BE “fair.” Because she did not get married to get divorced. Because she has 5 kids who are heartbroken and disillusioned and upset about the situation their parents are in. Because she had planned on a Future, that didn’t include getting divorced, that may have included kids’ graduations from high school and weddings and grandkids, with all the traditions you see in an intact family. Because at one time, she had a Dream of what life as a married person would look like.

And that Dream is dead, not to be resuscitated. No divorce settlement will ever be able to make all the pain ok or right or fix it. Getting divorced Hurts. Bad. Even when it really NEEDS to happen. Getting divorced is like running head-on into a wall. Boom. Turn around. Start over. Somehow. And a lot of times that “starting over” is from less than Scratch. Like, no retirement left, no job experience, kids and expenses but not enough income to pay for everything AND maintain any kind of actual life.

You’ve gotta take some time to grieve after a divorce…Maybe a long time. Because getting divorced is the ULTIMATE break up. And we all know breaking up is hard to do.

They say time and mercy heal all wounds. The challenge is surviving the passage of time, ya’ll. So be gentle with your divorcing and newly divorced friends. It’s a pretty horrific thing they’re going through.

If you’ve read very many of my blog posts, you kind of start to get a feeling for things that I’m passionate about. Like

Fathers’ Rights. I deeply believe that the best way to keep our kids whole through the divorce process is for them to have BOTH parents in their lives. In this world of family law, where custody seems to default to moms, we should not forget that there are a lot of really great dads out there who are heartbroken at losing time to just Be around their kids on a daily basis. While that may not be practical in a divorce, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t work to keep Dad there as often as possible. And intentionally keeping a loving father from his kids IS child abuse. We need the courts to take it more seriously, and we need a general shift in societal thinking that defaults away from thinking that single moms are always saints.

and

Domestic Abuse. By this I mean ALL forms of abuse. We tend to think only in terms of physical violence as being abusive, but psychological abuse may be far more pervasive, and can take a helluva lot longer to get over. Victims of abuse tend to be less likely to have custody of their kids, because they tend also to have less access to resources with which to hire a lawyer in a divorce. Moms who don’t have their kids could well have been victims of domestic abuse in their marriages, and every day of their lives without their kids is just another stab in the heart by the abuser. We as a community (especially a community like I live in here in Utah) need to lay off judging moms who did not get custody as though they’re some sort of addict or loser. Heaping misery on the wounded is cruel; we are better than that.

and

Kids. It seems like in any divorce action, kids always end up being the Big Losers. They don’t get any choice in their whole worlds getting thrown into chaos; in Utah, they have no choice, really, who they get to live with. And even if they DID have the option, how do you choose between two parents you love dearly? I remember being a freshman in college and having a nightmare that my parents were divorcing, and that I was begging them not to, and they wouldn’t listen. I woke up sobbing, and had to call my mom to make sure that it was just a really bad dream. The biggest pain in my life is knowing the MY kids never got to wake up from that Really Bad Dream. I’ve been divorced nearly 12 years, and I still feel horrible every time I think about it (like now, writing this post, and blowing my nose and wiping my eyes.)

and

Fairness. and Decency. and Human Kindness. and Equity. I mean, seriously….whatever happened to these values? I see them evidenced in some divorce cases, but way more often it’s as though the parties feel a need to feed the fight, and take whatever they possibly can, and hurt the other person, no matter what the cost. I know I’m way too sensitive (part of why I can’t do this family law thing full time anymore), but I don’t think it’s asking too much for people to apply a little Golden Rule into their lives, even if their lives include ex spouses. Do unto others as you would have them do to you, ya’ll. Or better yet, don’t do things to them that you wouldn’t want them to do to you.

And if we would all live by just that one little rule, what a wonderful world it would be.

Life is not perfect; I think we all know that. I’ve had a rough couple of days. I was up working until 11:00 last night (Yeah! E-filing! Damn YOU!!!! E-filing!!!) I woke up with the knowledge that I had another full day, but at least my first “You must wear clothes and look presentable” appointment wasn’t until 11 a.m. Before that, I got an email from a client thanking me profusely for the teeny tiny itty bitty thing I had done for him, and a phone call from an older lady who has called me no less than a dozen times in the past 3 months, thanking me for helping her. I did precious little for her; I just answered the phone when she called.

This afternoon I had two new client consultations. Not difficult stuff. One may become a new client; one can probably handle things on her own. The first one was distraught….Have ya’ll noticed I’m a big fat cry baby? I try really hard not to cry with my clients, but damn it! I suck at that…

I had other work that I did, work that pays, work that will hopefully protect my client from BigLaw’s nasty allegations come next Monday when I have to be in SLC at 9:00a.m. for a hearing. I hope I did enough. I hate responding to BigLaw’s filings. They really suck. But then there is this Woman, my client, with a child. And I am again emotionally sucked into it without even wanting to be.

I have gotten better. I don’t cry with all of them anymore. I can pat their shoulders, squeeze a hand, and give them reassurance, while telling them what to expect. I can walk away, relieved that they can’t afford a lawyer because I just KNOW they would turn into Super Needy client who runs out of money and becomes the most demanding at that point.

I had some personal distress this week as well. And this morning, as I was sunk in the Lows of that, I had the Highs of my client and this old lady telling me that I am definitely OK.

It’s a weird place to live, my head….My therapist thinks I’m great. He doesn’t have to deal with my neurosis….

Like the poor jackass pictured above, it’s possible I was carrying a little too much…

Law school was tough. Like, if you just had to do law school, without adding to it trying to still pay my bills and see my kids and deal with the weather in Wyoming when driving, it would still suck. So I hunted for inspiration. This was something I found inspiring…

I was hunting on my computer today for my address labels document/template (what exactly DID I name that thing anyway???) when I came across this poem by Rudyard Kipling that I’d found years ago and loved.

If

by Rudyard Kipling; 1865-1936

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too:

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thought your aim,

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two imposters just the same:

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings:

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss:

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a man, my son!

Kipling wrote this with respect to becoming a Man, but I would propose that one does not need testicles to Become the thing one would If he/she could do all of the things noted above. This is about being a solid human being. Hoping that I can become Kipling’s ideal “Man” someday.

My dad, his sister, and his brother…These are those who have become Kipling’s ideal “Man”. May I be as much in my life.

Recent Posts

Archives

Archives

Idaho Law

Idaho Child Support Calculator Software!
This is an online subscription child support calculation software for the state of Idaho. It’s a subscription site, but it does have a 14 day free trial option available.

Idaho Child Support Guidelines
This is a pretty lengthy PDF document, but scroll to the bottom…it has a table with child support amounts already calculated based on total income of both parties.

Idaho Child Support Services
LOTS of good information regarding getting a child support order, enforcing it, modifying it, and forms to do all these things on your own.

My Links

CLIMB Wyoming
CLIMB Wyoming is an organization whose goal is to help single mothers become better educated and able to support themselves and their families.

Department of Defense Manpower Data Single Record Request
A Military Service Affidavit is required in all divorce filings in this state….It has to do with complying with the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act. Use this link to get a certificate from DOD showing the military status of opposing party in your case.

Facing Facts: BPDfamily.com
This is a great site with pertinent information that can be used in dealing with an ex (or spouse or child) who has borderline personality disorder. Solid information.

Kathy Elton Consulting
Kathy is a mediator I’ve used before. I like her style, and I like her prices :). Additionally, her website has a blog that has good information regarding mediation (required by law in all UT divorces.)

Leaving the Law
A blog about finding life after being a lawyer…I need to read through all of these posts.

Low Income Housing US
This page is a clearinghouse for subsidized/low income rental housing information in all 50 states.

Utah Visitation Relocation Statute
There is statute that spells out what the minimum visitation should be when a parent relocates after a divorce/custody decree is entered. That’s HERE. Remember–these are MINIMUMS.